


We Really Filled It Up

by Keith_Wilde



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Family Feels, Fluff, Future Fic, Kid Fic, M/M, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-03
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:34:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25680652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keith_Wilde/pseuds/Keith_Wilde
Summary: Good news/bad news for Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews. Bad news: I've planned out their entire lives for them. Good news: it's a really great life.Or: It's the summer of 2060, fifty years after the Blackhawks won their first Cup in decades and brought hockey back to Chicago for good. In typical Hawks fashion, they bring the boys back to the UC to celebrate, and a seventy-year-old Jonny gets a chance to reflect back on the last half-century.
Relationships: Patrick Kane/Jonathan Toews
Comments: 12
Kudos: 93





	We Really Filled It Up

**Author's Note:**

> In honor of our boys doing so well the last couple days, here's some tooth-rotting fluff! I've grown really, really attached to this little fictional family I've given them, so don't be surprised if you see more of it despite it being something nobody asked for. *finger guns*
> 
> Title is a reference how, back when the United Center was at least half-empty every game, Patrick and Jonny would talk about how they had to fill the stadium up. And they did! Guys they're so good.
> 
> Song quote is from "Cecily Smith", a song from the musical "Fly by Night," which I haven't seen. The song is absolutely adorable though, and it'll make you cry a little about married old folks. 
> 
> Anyway, thanks for reading! I hope you get some feelings.

_ “Life is not the things that we do _

_ It's who we’re doing them with” _

-Will Connoly, “Cecily Smith” 

_ June 8, 2060, the United Center, Chicago, IL _

The rink was quiet.

To say that quiet wasn’t really the way Jonny remembered the UC would be an understatement. They’d seen more than a decade of sold-out games here from ice-level, and from the bottom of the bowl the noise had funneled down to create a sound like an oncoming train. Sure, he’d been here for plenty of quiet times, too, from way back when he and Patrick first started and they were playing for a handful of fans to leaving his office with his coaches’ clipboard tucked under his arm at two a.m. after a loss. But those weren’t the days he remembered. Those weren’t the days that  _ felt _ like the UC. The UC he remembered felt more like the goddamn Coliseum. 

Today, though, the rink was deserted. The “50 YEARS SINCE CHICAGO HOCKEY CAME HOME FOR GOOD” festivities wouldn’t start until tomorrow, and everything was ready, down to the last detail. Flights and hotels were booked. Ad campaigns had been run. Commemorative pucks and banners and hats had been signed and sold. The only thing left to do now was allow a couple of old men one last pass around the ice, in private, the one thing they’d requested.

The sounds of Patrick’s walker hitting the floor echoed around the arena. Specially outfitted for the ice, it was one of a few they’d invested in for different occasions. It's not like they didn’t have the money; though for all the stuff they’d bought, this was one of the few things Patrick would’ve purchased even if they’d only had a hundred dollars in the bank. After his fifth hip surgery ( _ over the course of thirty years, Jonny? That’s not bad,  _ Patrick had said as Jonny worried over his hospital bed.  _ Seabs had that many in like, a year at one point. _ ) getting around without some kind of assistance was a non-starter. It had been a battle at first, of course. It was like they were transported back to being twenty year-olds, with Jonny’s fear turning him uptight and overbearing like he hadn’t been in years, and Patrick reverting to being a stubborn child. He was Patrick  _ fucking  _ Kane, he would shout at Jonny, he was the fastest thing on two legs. But it turned out that two great legs were pretty useless with only one good hip, and eventually, reluctantly, Patrick relented. For probably the millionth time in his life, he re-learned how to lean on Jonny, just as Jonny was constantly relearning how to lean on him. It was the cycle of their life. 

Of course, one thing could be heard over the sound of the walker--the sound of two old men chirping each other.

“It’s been so long since we’ve been back to Chicago. Looks like 88 is finally going out of style--” 

“Oh yeah? When’s the last time you saw a Toews jersey in the UC?” 

Jonny could’ve pointed out that his jersey was still a top 5 Blackhawks seller, even after the spate of championships the team won in the 40’s. He could’ve gone out on the street and found a couple of  _ 19’ _ s within minutes. He could’ve pointed out that technically, the names on their mail listed them  _ both _ as Mr. Toews, that “Patrick Kane” had existed only as a public persona for decades now. But he knew Patrick knew all this. They’d been together in one form or another since they were twenty. And they kept skating the same circles around each other because even after all this time, they couldn’t get enough of the motion. 

They finally arrived at the edge of the ice. Patrick’s walker preceded them, as it always did, now. Jonny had a moment of nerves as they transitioned to the surface, but he needn’t have worried. Ruined hip or not, Patrick was still Patrick, and as soon as he was on the ice Jonny had to push to catch up with him.

“Jesus. Give a guy a warning, Peeks.”

“Sorry,” Patrick said. “Wouldn’t want you to ruffle your perfect hair.” 

“You’re just jealous you haven’t had hair in decades,” Jonny replied. 

“You probably pulled it all out, you always did like it rough--” 

“Never heard you complaining though, eh?”

“Shut up and skate, old man.”

“I could skate circles around you then and I’ll skate circles around you now.”

“So do it then.”

“I will.” 

He didn’t move from Patrick and his walker. They continued gliding around the ice, the comfort of forty-odd years cushioning the silence of the rink. 

***

It was the first time they’d been back to Chicago in almost a year. After a pair of distinguished careers in the Windy City (was anyone surprised when Jonny started working his way up the Hawks coaching staff? Or when Patrick used his photographic memory and analysis skills to go into broadcasting?) they’d finally decided it was time. Canada had been calling back to Jonny for a long time, and the hectic life they’d made in Chicago was finally winding down. Jonny missed the lake. He missed fishing. He wanted an  _ actual _ garden, not just towers; he wanted quiet and to occasionally hear French from someone who didn’t have Patrick’s mangled accent. Most of all, though, he wanted a place where things would be easy for Patrick, and their home in Chicago wasn’t that place. He knew that his husband could and would battle through whatever came his way, and with a smile on his face, too; but Jonny also thought that Pat deserved better than to spend the last years of his life in pain. It was a win-win, really; he got to go back to his home, and he could let Patrick think it was his idea, that he was doing it to make Jonny happy when Jonny was really doing it to keep Patrick safe. 

So they retired to the Lake of the Woods. It wasn’t a bad way to live, in Jonny’s opinion, besides Patrick’s unending chirps about how they could still get a house on Toews Lake. And being away from the kids, of course. 

Each of their kids had been carried by a different Kane sister. They hadn’t meant it to end up that way exactly, but when you know your family is complete, you just know. Five years and three babies later they were the proud fathers of Andrea Eleanor Sharp Toews, Joel Don Seabrook Toews, and Marie Magnolia Norah Toews. Or, if you asked Patrick, they were dads to Andie, JJ, and Momo. Or Mo. It depended on his mood. And hers. They were a pretty tempestuous pair, the two of them together.

So being away from them was tough. But they called often, and when they did Patrick was always there to answer. 

“Andie,” he would launch as soon as he picked up the phone, “you’ve gotta talk to your dad. I can’t listen to him go on about these fuckin’ tomatoes anymore. You’ve gotta save me.”

And she would roll her eyes and assent. She was more than happy to pretend she bought into this schtick where they couldn’t stand each other. She  _ knew _ people whose parents couldn’t stand each other. Those parents didn’t get caught kissing in back hallways of museums on family vacations. Those parents didn’t look lost when separated for the weekend. Those parents didn’t fall asleep tucked into each other on the couch, even now, even though it irritated their arthritis. 

“Jonny! Come talk to your daughter!” Patrick would yell from the back porch. 

“Who’s on the phone?” Jon would yell back from the garden, years of goal horns and crowds having ruined his hearing. 

“It’s Andie!” 

And Jonny would put down the hose and jog over, muttering under his breath that if Patrick was just going to Americanize her name, they could’ve just called her Tiffany or something. Patrick would roll his eyes as he passed over the phone. They’d been having this conversation since she was born. She was thirty-five. 

“Andrea, my girl,” Jonny would smile into the phone. 

“ _ Merde,  _ Daddy, why do you have to exhaust Dad?”

“ _ I  _ exhaust  _ him?  _ Were you  _ sitting  _ with him at your son’s little league game when we came to visit? For fuck’s sake…” 

Andrea was the most like Jonny. She was over-achieving, and effortlessly cool under pressure, and nervous when she wasn’t in absolute control. She was a carrier of the Olympic torch for the family, earning a silver for the US Women’s Hockey Team one go-around and a gold the next. Jonny had spent a lot of time on the phone with her after that first silver, soothing her, assuring her that she wasn’t a wash-up or a failure, talking her off the ledge that Jonny knew so intimately. 

Momo, on the other hand, was all Patrick. A free spirit, she was small and fast, generally barefoot if she wasn’t in skates. She and Patrick would gang up on Jonny, both grinning identically, thick as thieves--though she did have Jonny’s dark, intense eyes. She was mischievous, in trouble constantly, and the only member of the family who had been thrown out of a hockey game as a spectator (fighting with Canucks fans.) 

She’d intended to stay at UND a max of two years like her dad, but when she’d had her wrist shattered badly enough to damage the nerves and give her a semi-permanent tremor, she’d decided to stick around and actually think about a degree. Patrick, never wanting to push like his father had, had gently asked if she thought she could adapt her style of play, but his efforts were all in vain. ( _ You taught me to play with my hands, Dad. I’d be mediocre without them, and I’m not going to play mediocre. I’m five-four, barely 140 pounds. I’m not going to play without my hands. _ ) A few years of soul-searching ensued, and now she was the head chef at an intimate, cozy-yet-exclusive French comfort food restaurant in Chicago, the preeminent spot for Blackhawks players to take their partners when they actually wanted some privacy. It was a role perfectly suited for the Toews child who had inherited the worst of both her father’s tempers. Even with her tiny stature, rumors of how her cooks feared her had spread all up and down the Chicago River. She’d become quite the food writer on the side as well--a James Beard Award winner, actually. Still a family of champs, Patrick bragged around.

Joel, on the other hand, had inherited all of Patrick’s sensitivity and none of the competitiveness. In a house that usually ran at full volume, he was quiet, much the same way Jonny had been as a child. He preferred to observe, to hang back, happy just to be included. He usually kept score in their family two-on-two hockey matches, though he was so scared of making anybody upset that they pretty much did it themselves. What he loved most as he got older was just being a brother, going to all his sisters’ practices even when he was old enough not to, even when he just read his books through them. Patrick and Jonny each saw a little of the other in him, and never pushed him into sports, though he was as at-home on the ice as the rest of them. While Andy and Momo chased each other around on their skates, playing keep-away, he would pensively skate behind, keeping the peace when things got out of hand. He was the one who was wise beyond his years, the one everyone came to for advice. He was never Joel, always JJ, the only one whose nickname they agreed on. Their soft boy. 

So that was the picture they made during family skates when the kids were young: Andrea would be proudly leading the way for them all; Patrick would be twirling Momo around, skates in the air; and the other two would be quietly smiling, Jonny holding onto JJ’s ankles as he rode on his shoulders, little hands gripping Jonny’s hat, both just happy to be there. 

***

Sometimes Jonny thought about the beginnings of their so-called retirements, when things had, if not a sense of calm, a bit of simplicity to them. He remembered a day--a series of days, really, happening over and over again through seasons and years, changing but not by much--when Andrea was 8, JJ was 6, and Momo was 4. 

It was the kind of Saturday they had pretty often in the off-season, though this one happened during the snowy, bitterly cold reprieve of the All-Star break.

Jonny was standing at the kitchen island in a ratty old “ _ Pat and Pat on the Puck _ ” t-shirt (Sharpy and Patrick’s talk show on ESPN) and sweats, in the kind of lazy late-morning that was quickly turning to afternoon. He was tweaking his recipe while Momo sat on the counter and tasted for him. Swinging her little legs and observing carefully, it was the only time (outside of watching hockey games) that he could get her to sit still. 

“Open,” he said.

He popped a spoonful of the cookie dough in her mouth. Making halfway-decent gluten-free baked goods was hard; he really did need her opinion. She scrunched her nose. 

“Ew, Daddy. More salt. And more chocolate chips.” She put her little fists in the chocolate chip bag and dropped in whole handfuls. 

“What? No way,” Jonny said. He called out to the living room. “JJ! Come try this!” 

“But I’m almost done with my chapter!” 

Jonny was rolling his eyes fondly when he heard the front door bang open, hockey bags and sticks clattering to the floor.

“Hi, Daddy,” Andrea said, she and Patrick thundering into the kitchen like a hurricane. She stopped for a quick kiss on the cheek before going straight for the fridge. Jonny felt Patrick come up behind him, giving a light peck to the back of his neck.

“Hi, Daddy,” Patrick whispered in his ear, the grin audible in his voice. Jonny flushed, but he was smiling, too.

“You’re gross,” he said to Patrick. Patrick just gave him a covert ass-grab before stealing a taste of the cookie dough.

“Gross? Why’s Daddy gross?” Momo asked.

“Uh--” Jonny looked to Patrick, but he’d already solved the problem. 

“Because I’m so sweaty, duh. Don’t you want a hug?!” he said, coming after Momo as she dropped off the counter to run away and shriek with laughter. Jonny could hear Patrick chasing her around, energetic even after a full morning at the rink with their  _ other _ daughter. Speaking of their other daughter, she was standing next to him, arms raised in the universal language of children who want to be picked up. She was getting a little big for that, but Jonny had never been one to deny his favorite people anything. 

“How was your skate today,  _ ma cheri? _ ” He planted a kiss to the side of her still-chilly face as she peered into the bowl. 

“Cold. And my backhand still sucks.” 

“But your stride is getting better all the time, and that’s the basis of your skillset, baby. Try this.” 

He had added more already, so he groaned when her first comment upon tasting was, “More chocolate chips.” 

“You are your dad’s daughter, through and through.” 

“Are you trying to distract me because my backhand still sucks?”

He _ was  _ trying to distract her, actually, but only because he knew how her mind worked. Because it was just like his. 

“How are you so smart? See, someone as smart as you could never be bad at hockey.”

“It’s true,” Patrick said, striding back into the room with a giggling Momo clutched to his chest. “Hockey sense is the number one predictor of success in the NHL. Me and Uncle Sharpy just did a whole segment on it yesterday.” 

“Hey, speakin’ of Sharpy,” Jonny said, “is Maddie still good to babysit this weekend?” 

“Yes, don’t worry, I’ve got it all covered.”

“Where are you going?” JJ suddenly popped up, never one to be left out. 

“It’s a surprise for your dad.” Patrick was giving Jonny that mischievous grin he had, the one where he was biting his tongue a little without realizing it. Every time he did it, Jonny thought he looked just like that 18 year-old kid the Hawks had drafted all those years ago. Patrick looked back down at JJ. “But if you come outside and be my goalie, maybe I’ll let you help me plan.” 

“Didn’t you just spend all morning playing hockey?”

“Yes, but I happen to know  _ you _ spent all morning on the couch reading--”

Jonny gave him the “education is important” side eye.

“Which is great,” Patrick backpedaled, “but buddy, you need to get outside. C’mon, let’s go. Besides, you’re the best goalie in the house. I need you.”

That made JJ smile big enough to reveal the hole where he’d just lost a baby tooth. Patrick turned to Andie. 

“And  _ you  _ need a bath, because not showering after hockey practice is gross--” and then he turned back to the little girl in his arms, kissing the side of her head incessantly, “and  _ you  _ need a bath because you’re covered in flour.” 

Jonny just leaned against the counter, content. Yeah. He’d picked a pretty good dad for his kids.

“Move out, troops!” Patrick shepherded the kids out of the kitchen before turning around and calling back to Jonny, “Cookies need more chocolate chips!” 

An hour later the cookies were hot out of the oven, the kids were all clean,  _ the Mighty Ducks  _ was queued up on the TV and the swirling snow outside had been forgotten. Piled on top of each other on the couch like a bunch of kittens, barely twenty minutes had passed before they were all snoring. Jonny had taken a lot of naps in his time in the hockey world. But this one was definitely the best. 

***

Those days had come and gone, but the spirit of the family had stayed the same. If anything, there was more chaos to go around now, what with them accumulating more grandkids every year. So there wasn’t  _ too  _ much to miss, but that didn’t mean Jonny didn’t remember those days fondly. 

“What are you smiling about?” Patrick asked, breaking into Jonny’s thoughts as they kept skating. 

“Just thinking about when the kids were little.”

“Aww, this whole fifty-year celebration has you all sentimental, babe.”

Jonny knew Patrick was riding him, but he didn’t have the heart to return it. He put an arm out and stopped their motion. Patrick looked at him questioningly, smile faltering just slightly. Jonny leaned down and kissed it off him entirely, right there on the ice.

“I love you,” he said simply when they pulled away. He was old. Seventy-two now. Who knew how many years they had left together? He didn’t have time for anything else but the truth. 

“I love you, too.” 

Patrick’s eyes were just as bright and blue and soft as they always had been. Maybe more so, now that the insecurity of youth had been replaced by contented confidence that he was wanted, legitimately, for something other than hockey. Confidence that came from having a family who loved him without expectation. Watching Patrick grow comfortable being taken care of and subsequently more comfortable being himself was the great privilege of Jonny’s life. He knew that conventional wisdom would suggest the opposite, but he really thought that his husband had just gotten more beautiful every year they’d been together. 

“Sure you’re not tired of me yet?” Patrick asked.

Jonny shrugged.

“Maybe it's all for the optics at this point. I’m pretty fuckin’ committed by now, eh?”

Patrick gave him a light slap and started skating again as Jonny laughed at his own joke, dropping a kiss on the top of Kaner’s head. 

***

The boys were all already there on the ice when Patrick and Jonny arrived at the pregame ceremony the next night. They waved to the crowd and took their place standing by Sharpy, Duncs and Seabs.

“Hey boys.” Patrick’s trademark grin still looked the same, fifty years on. 

“Kaner. Tazer. Or should I say Tazer and Tazer?” Duncs said, staring straight ahead. 

“You’re about forty years late if that’s your idea of a chirp, Duncs,” Patrick said. They were whispering like middle school boys in the back row of class.

“Duncs is still pissed he wasn’t Best Man,” Seabs said.

“It’s been forty years, Duncs, let it go,” Jonny grinned.

“Look, I’m just sayin’,” Duncs said, “Sharpy I understand. But Oshie? C’mon now.” 

“Oshie did a good job!” 

“He’ll die mad about it,” Seabs said.

“At least I don’t look like I’m dead yet, unlike some people, eh, Seabsie?” Duncs fired back.

“Guys, guys,” Sharpy cut in, “We all know I was the best Best Man. What’s to debate?”

“Shut up, I think they’re saying something.” 

The announcers were indeed saying something. The boys held the pretense of paying attention a whole two minutes while the fans cheered before Patrick was nudging Seabrook.

“How’s your hair still do that, Seabs?” Seabs’ hair still was as long and luscious as ever, just silver instead of dark brown. 

“It’s actually implants.”

“Really?”

“No, ya fuckin’ pheasant,” he hissed. 

They straightened back up under Jonny’s glare. Down the line Versteeg and Laddy were giggling about something. Hunched over the walker, Patrick was now a full head shorter than Buff, who was resting his elbow on Pat’s shoulder. From the second row Burr was poking Sharpy and then pretending it wasn’t him. Some things never change.

Patrick zeroed in on where the kids and grandkids were sitting, nudging Jonny so they could wave. Jonny had  _ told  _ them that they didn’t have to drag everyone out for this, but they’d insisted, and he had to admit that it felt better to see Andie and JJ and Momo in the crowd even though he wasn’t playing, than it had to play every day in front of twenty thousand strangers.

The ceremony went off without a hitch. They took a million pictures; they got some commemorative junk that the girls would insist they hang up in the house. They had plans to take all the boys’ families and rent out Momo’s restaurant for the night. Now, though, Jonny was just drinking it in. Remembering everything that had brought them to this point, every goal and check and practice and bead of sweat and celly and triumphant cup and tear cried into each other’s shoulder pads. 

It was exactly what he’d wanted since he was that serious little kid playing backyard hockey on a homemade rink. 

But what he hadn’t known as a kid was that none of it was really important. What was important was where it brought him, and who it brought him to.

“Hey,” Patrick whispered, nudging him and gesturing at the crowd. “We really filled it up, huh?” 

Jonny smiled down at his husband, chest surging and throat tight. He put his hand over Patrick’s and squeezed. 

“Yeah, Peeks. I guess we did.” 

**Author's Note:**

> PS Let's beat Edmonton <3


End file.
